Route 66.
Entropy#1 is about the geography of a place, along the now abandoned stretch of route 66 that lies between Grand Canyon and Las Vegas, two icons of American culture, two sides of the same paradox. It shows, raw to the naked eye, how the west was made: vast expanses of semi-desert land without a sense of property or boundaries that were fenced by “reason” (the grid), greed and violence, symbolized here by barbed wire. Barbed wire defines property, territory, violent limits to freedom whether it be movement, emotion, or thought. Submitted to confinement, emotions and thoughts find themselves curtailed; they dry up running the risk of dying. Structure can help organization and communication, life in society. Authoritarian and violent structures kill the human spirit, generate suspicion and fear, and ultimately a violent response of the entrapped spirit before it is destroyed. The last concept at play here is one we cannot escape and that links time and entropy (the loss of energy), the constant evolution of everything that is. Once a symbol of a thriving economy, of the “go west” drive, this billboard by the side of the road, on the other side of the fence, has become a prey to, and a part of the elements: sun, wind, rain. At core, photographs are about contemplation....of one's life.